


Nights When They Play

by howardently



Category: My Mad Fat Diary
Genre: Alternate Universe - Rock Band, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-18
Updated: 2017-06-18
Packaged: 2018-11-15 16:59:44
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,873
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11235300
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/howardently/pseuds/howardently
Summary: He’s leaning against a pool table, the game abandoned as he chats amiably with a group of guys still holding their cues. She watches his hands, the way his fingers curl around the lip of the table, the way they shift against his thigh. The long line of his leg, narrow in his dark jeans, the perfect thirty degree bend of his knee. The pull of his t shirt over his shoulders, the way the fabric pools at his waist.He’s easier in parts. It’s more theoretical that way, the wanting. More clinical.AKA... BAND AU





	Nights When They Play

He’s expansive tonight, stage Finn. She watches him from her seat at the bar, shaking her head as he claps a tall guy on the shoulder and squeezes, wearing his familiar manic energy like a costume. Finn elbows the guy in the ribs, and the whole group laughs riotously. Rae rolls her eyes.

She hates when he gets like this. She much prefers regular Finn, easy Finn, Finn of the haughty opinions and careless banter, Finn whose laughter always sounds like a surprise. She even prefers grumpy, sullen Finn, who scowls into his pint and can’t be drawn out with anything less than the boldest of taunts. Performer Finn just makes her feel small.

“Nelson’s on fire tonight.” Manny laughs, leaning over the bar in front of her. She shoots him a brief, tight smile, and they both return to watching Finn as he shakes a rail-thin girl jokingly and all her friends giggle in envy.

“I hate when he gets like this.” Rae says, because it feels good to talk about him behind his back, because she owes this Finn no loyalty.

“Seems obnoxious.” Rae swivels on her stool to face him, turning her back on Finn Nelson. Manny shrugs and pulls a pint glass from under the bar. “But I can see why he’s got so many fans, I guess. He seems to be charming them pretty well. Another one, babes?”

“It’s my round, so for the whole table, if you don’t mind.” Rae sighs, spinning to look at Finn again. No less than three girls are touching him in some capacity; she rolls her eyes again and looks away. “Oh, the fans. All the many, many female fans.”

Manny chuckles as he fills glasses and sets them onto a tray. “Who do you think he’s going to pull tonight? My money’s on the blonde.” Manny jerks his head towards the group, where a bottle-blonde girl is squeezing Finn’s bicep and pressing her breasts against his arm less than subtly.

“Nah,” Rae shakes her head, “definitely the brunette at the pool table. Look at the way she’s watching him. She’s on the prowl.”

“Like someone else I know.” He tilts his head towards the generous cleavage Rae’s got on display tonight, and she shoots him a roguish grin, though she can feel the flush warming her cheeks.

“You know it.” She shoots back, and he laughs. “Where’s that fine, speccy piece of ass I call my own?” She looks around the bar, cranes her head, but she doesn’t spot Archie. She sighs heavily, and Manny sets a shot glass full of amber liquid in front of her. “What’s this?”

“On me.”

“Oh, you’re so sweet, Manny.”

“Nah, it’s not that I’m sweet, it’s more that you’re so pathetic that I can’t help but give you free booze.”

“Oi!” She protests, approximating a wounded face. She pushes the drink away. “Just because my boyfriend is a…” She leans in, draws out the word, “homosexual… does not mean that I am pathetic.”

Manny shakes his head. “No, but the fact that your homosexual boyfriend is in a dark corner snogging another bloke does.”

Rae swivels her head to glance where he’s pointing, grimacing when she spots Archie in a heated embrace, glasses askew. She flattens her lips and gives Manny a resigned sigh. “Cheers then.”

“Cheers.” He retorts, allowing her to clink the glass against his fist.

“Someday Manny, there will be inappropriate grinding in a dark corner for me too. Someday my prince will come.”

“Hey, I been trying to get you to go out with me for ages, baby. I could snog you in a corner like nobody’s business.”

“You’re too good for me, love, I told ya. Someday your prince will come too. In the meantime, I think the blonde’s available.” She says, eyes sparkling over the top of her glass.

“I do just fine, thanks.” Manny says, but he’s looking over at the girl with his mouth pursed. He clears his throat and adjusts himself. Rae laughs, and he rolls his eyes at her before changing the subject. “So, Rae, I didn’t see you here on Tuesday. It was packed. Did you catch that band that was playing?”

“No, Tim covered that one. He said they were good.”

“They were, you’da liked ‘em.”

“He gave me the demo, but I haven’t had time to listen to it. I’ll be here tomorrow though. Do you know anything about them? Vamp Camp?”

Manny shakes his head and sets another Snakebite on the tray to replace the one Rae’s got halfway drunk already. She smiles a thank you at him. “No, Michelle booked ‘em. I’ve never heard of them before.”

“Oh, Michelle. Our favorite.”

Manny snorts. “You wouldn’t believe what she said the other night, Rae. It was late and we were just about to close…”

“Rae! You want to get back here with those drinks? Some of us are growing old here, wasting away!” Chop’s voice carries through the bar, and for a moment everyone stills. Rae can feel herself getting hotter and redder. But the din picks back up after just a second and Rae shakes her head at her favourite bartender.

“So, what did she say?” Rae asks, taking a cooling sip of her drink. Manny shakes his head, smile on his face.

“You’d better get back to your table, Rae. Wouldn’t want that group o’ fit birds to turn into a gang of old biddies. Come a little early tomorrow and I’ll tell you all about it.”

“Alright then.” Rae says, levering herself up on the bar to press a kiss to his cheek. Manny shakes his head and hands her the tray.

She balances the tray on her hip with practiced ease, skirting around the crowd toward the back table.

“There she is!” Chop calls, and a chorus of cheers greets her as she sets the drinks down. There’s a scrabbling of hands as they all reach at once for the glasses, sloshing beer onto the table. Rae pulls hers out deftly and slides into the booth beside Izzy. “Right, where was I?”

“Do we have to? Your jokes are always so foul and offensive.” Chloe huffs, but Chop merely slings an arm around her shoulders and wags his eyebrows at her.

“You know you love it, Chlo. The dirtier, the better, isn’t that what you’re always saying?”

Chloe shoots an appealing look at Izzy. “He hasn’t even told the joke yet and he’s already being horrible. Can’t you stop him, Iz?”

“What do you want me to do?” Izzy laughs, shrugging her whole body. The drinks she’s had already seem almost a visible aura around her, an acid yellow alcopop haze. Rae can’t help but grin at her.

“Right, so, a woman’s working at a bank, and a man comes in with a ski mask and a gun.” Chop’s wearing the ridiculous grin he only ever has when he’s about to tell a terrible joke. Chloe groans and downs half her drink in one go. “He comes right up to her, points the gun right at her and says, ‘Open the vault.’ The woman puts her hands in the air, stutters, “But, but, sir! This is a SPERM bank.”

“Here we go…” Chloe mutters. Chop is somehow grinning harder.

“So the man, he says, ‘Yeah, I know. Now open the vault.’ And he waves his gun at her and shit. The woman is bricking it now, cause obviously the guys a total nutter, so she stands up and opens the vault. And he tells her to go get some of the spunk, so she comes back out with the stuff and he tells her to open one and drink it.”

“Eugh.” Izzy makes a comically disgusted face. Chloe shoves at Chop to let her out, which only serves to make him gleefully wrap his arm tighter over her collar bones.

“No, no, this is the best part, Chlo. You can’t miss the best part!”

Rae laughs, sinking deeper into the warm liquid feeling she only ever gets on nights like this. The buzz in her bones from the show -   the sensation she’s been chasing since that first night she’d heard a really good band play, that vibrating that’s determined the direction of her career, her whole life - has settled into a pleasant haziness of booze and joy.

So of course, her eyes are off looking for him.

She doesn’t like to think about it, really. She’s good at suppressing it entirely until she passes the four drink mark, but there’s something about him that’s got that same kind of resonance. When he’s playing, it’s magnetic, it’s the most _her_ she ever feels, standing there in the crowd with the notes pulsing through her ribcage. But even off the stage, even when he’s shrugged off his band self and settled into the skin of ordinary, just-a-guy Finn, he’s still got it in him. Her bones always hum when he’s around.

He’s leaning against a pool table, the game abandoned as he chats amiably with a group of guys still holding their cues. She watches his hands, the way his fingers curl around the lip of the table, the way they shift against his thigh. The long line of his leg, narrow in his dark jeans, the perfect thirty degree bend of his knee. The pull of his t shirt over his shoulders, the way the fabric pools at his waist.

He’s easier in parts. It’s more theoretical that way, the wanting. More clinical. She laughs and looks at her hands.

When she looks back up at him, it’s clear she’s been caught. He wears a wry, knowing grin and a raised eyebrow - an amplification of the same flirty look he’d been giving the blond earlier. She wants to look away, feels the instinct to demure, so she forces herself to hold his gaze, longer longer longer… until something hot and red starts to wriggle in her stomach.

Slowly, Finn rises to his feet, unfolding his length languidly. He’s still talking to one of the pool players, but his eyes haven’t left hers.

Thankfully, the table bursts into riotous commotion just then. Beside her, Izzy’s practically climbing on top of the table to swat at Chop with an open palm. Rae looks gratefully down for a long moment.

“You horrible, nasty boy!” Izzy’s hollering, one of her knees upsetting an empty bottle.

Chloe is gagging with exaggerated disdain, twisted in her seat to shove at Chop with both hands. Tears are streaming down Chop’s face, he’s laughing so hard. His braying makes several heads turn in their direction once more, something Rae should be used to by now, but can never quite get comfortable with.

“What happened? Did I miss the punch line?”

“You do NOT want to hear it!” Chloe shrieks, adding her feet against Chop’s hips to her effort to push him out of the booth. He’s clinging to the edge of the table to keep from sliding out of his seat, but Izzy’s relentless swatting at his shoulders is distracting him and he’s losing ground.

“Seriously, Rae? How could you’ve missed it? It’s one of my best jokes yet!” He’s now hanging on with only one hand, using the other to shield his head. Izzy’s got both knees on the table, and Rae leans back as far as she can to avoid her wriggling mate. “As soon as Finn gets his arse back over here, I’ll tell it again.”

“No you will not!” Chloe and Izzy exclaim in chorus. Chloe redoubles her shoving, and Chop finally tumbles out of the booth. Rae moves quickly to catch their glasses as Chop lands in a heap of groaning and laughter at Finn’s feet.

“Sperm bank?” Finn chuckles, stepping over Chop to slide into the booth beside Rae. Chop grabs at one of his boots, but Finn kicks him off. “I told you not to tell that one to the girls.”

“He’s out of control on nights when you play, you know that?” Chloe shoots accusingly at Finn. He shrugs and picks through the glasses on the table for a mostly full pint.

Chop’s head pops up above the edge of the table. “I’m out of control all the time, baby. I’m a rock star! Isn’t that right, Iz?”

“You’re a pervert, is what you are.”

“You love it.”

Izzy settles back into her seat, and Rae shuffles down a bit, expecting Finn to move too, even them out along the bench. But he slides in the other direction, closer to her, presses up against her hip and gives her another liquid look. He’s a wall of heat, smelling like sweat and beer and man. She moves slightly closer to Izzy.

Finn lifts his arm to rest along the back of the booth behind her, and the intensity of his warmth increases against her side. She can feel beads of sweat forming on the back of her neck. She downs the rest of her drink, hoping the cool liquid might help. It doesn’t.

“Is Johnno coming, Chlo?” Rae asks, ignoring Finn’s audible cluck beside her. He’s not exactly a fan of Chloe’s boyfriend. Neither is she, really, though she works harder at hiding it.

“No, we’ve broken up again.” Chloe heaves a frustrated sigh, leans across the table to be better heard. “He spent the weekend at his Mum’s, and he’s always a right prick after he comes back, full of what I should be like, what I should say, how I should act.”

“What was it this time?” Rae rolls her eyes. Finn lifts up in his seat, adjusts. Is he actually getting closer?

“My job again.” She growls. “Apparently it’s ‘unbecoming of a lady to dance in public.’ His Mum just can’t get over it.”

Chloe gives dance lessons at a local studio and moonlights as a go-go dancer at a club nearby. It’s mild dancing, nothing at all like stripping. The club is 60’s themed, and Chloe wears a little mod dress and boots up to her thighs. Johnno had only seen her dance once, but it had been enough to cause a reoccurring argument between the two of them, especially after he’d run off and told his Mummy. Honestly, she can’t see why Chloe tolerates him.

Behind her on the booth, Finn’s arm droops a little and his thumb starts to drift against her shoulder. Just a brush, an accident maybe… until it settles into tracing small barely there circles against her skin. It tingles in all the best ways, and in some of the worst ones too. She tries to ignore it, even as she gets that tightness in her skin, that slick flush of _maybe_. She knows better than to make anything of it, though.

“Honestly, it’s gotten ridiculous. He’s a grown man, he can’t always be siding with his Mum. You’d think she still chose…” Chloe gets a good steam on for one of her rants, but Rae misses it because Finn’s leaned over to whisper in her ear.

“Ten quid says they’ll be back together within the week.” He grumbles, voice low. His breath is scalding against her sweat-sticky neck. She can’t hide her shiver this time. He sits back with a smug grin.

Rae leans forward deliberately, ignoring him, tilts her glass towards Chloe. “Well, you don’t need him, Chlo! You’re a strong, independent woman, and you don’t need any man!” It’s all she’s allowed to say, she’d learned that the hard way. In two weeks, when she’s back with him, she’ll go cold and bitter on Rae if she harps on about what a twat he is. He is a twat, but his twattishness must remain unspoken.

“Hear, hear!” Chop cheers, the first one to clink his glass against Rae’s. Chloe’s joins shortly after, then Izzy’s. Finn holds back, lips pursed. “We’re all independent women here! Super foxy ladies!”

“Damn right!” Izzy adds, slapping a palm against the table.

“In fact…” Chop holds a finger up in the air, like he’s had a brilliant idea. He grins wildly, clambering out of the booth towards the jukebox. A few seconds later, an electric screech sounds through the pub as he pulls the chord, followed by silence, and then a collective groan. “Wait for it, you wankers!” Chop yells.

Rae laughs, exchanging a wide eyed look with Chloe. Chop really is out of control when they play. After another moment, music starts to drift through the bar, chatter being replaced by the velvety strains of Gloria. _At first I was afraid, I was petrified…_

“Ohhhh!” Izzy croons, nodding at Chloe.

Chop reappears at the end of the table. “C’mon Chlo. You know what you’ve gotta do.”

“No.” She protests as Chop tugs on her arm. “I’m not doing it.”

“You have to, It’s the rules.” Izzy tells her firmly, then shakes a hand at Rae and Finn. “Budge up, you two.”

Laughing, they slide out of the booth to let Izzy join her boyfriend in pulling on Chloe. Finn puts a hand low on Rae’s back as Izzy brushes by, like he’s trying to steady her, but he doesn’t drop it. After a brief, and fairly halfhearted struggle on Chloe’s part, all five of them are standing. Chop starts to swivel his hips, wide and jerky. Chloe keeps shaking her head, narrow-eyed, trying not to laugh. It’s a lost cause, though, because in moments, Chops got one hand on each of her hips, forcing them to swivel, and Izzy’s crowded behind her, waving her hands to the same rhythm Chop’s forcing. They’re ridiculous, but all that band practice is good for keeping Chop and Izzy in sync.

“C’mon, Rae!” Izzy reaches out to grab at Rae’s arm. “Dance with us.”

She starts to step forward - it’s inevitable, Chop and Izzy are a force of nature, so she might as well not bother fighting it. But Finn slips his hand up from her back to hang over her shoulder. “Rae’s going to sit here and chat with me, thank you.”

“But she’s an independent woman, Finny. It’s the ruuuuules!” Izzy pleads.

“Not today, babes. I need her.” Finn gives her a sharp smile and crowds Rae into the booth, all the way down the bench into the corner. Izzy puckers up her face to let him know just what she thinks of that, but Chop’s already pulling her away, over to the side of the room where there’s a square of space that’s occasionally used as a dance floor. Unbelievably, Archie’s managed to peel himself away from his tonsil diving, and he and his date join them.

“What if I wanted to dance, Finn? Huh? You think about that before you started bossing me around?” She jabs at him. He drapes his arm back along the back of the booth again, determined to get into her space.

“Here.” He shoves another glass at her, and she’s pretty sure it wasn’t hers to begin with, but alcohol is sanitary, right? Self-cleaning? She takes a swig. Nice, it’s warm too. “You’re fine.”

“What would you know about how fine or not fine I am?”

Finn raises his eyebrows, smiles wickedly. “I know plenty.”

He takes a long slow drink of his pint, and she can’t tell if he’s deliberately showing off the line of his throat and the bob of his Adam’s apple, but it’s working, God help her. She watches helplessly. She may even be biting her lip a little, damn him.

“What’d you think of the set tonight?” He asks when he’s finished, when she’s looked away.

“Fine.” She scoffs.

“Fine?” He mocks, wrinkling his nose. “That’s it? You can do better than that.”

“Psh. Why, so I can puff up your already over inflated ego?”

Finn laughs, leans over to get right in her face. It’s a challenge, and she’s never done well with letting someone else win. She can play this game, too. She flicks her hair over her shoulder and is rewarded by his swift glance down.

He’s apparently unruffled when he speaks though. “Please, you know you loved it. You were out there jumping around and losing your mind with all the rest of the fans. We’re your favorite band, aren’t we, Rae?”

“Hardly.” She rolls her eyes, does a little leaning in of her own. If he can flirt like a maniac for his own amusement, so can she. “All the great bands in the world, in this _town_ , and you think I give a shit about you? Please.”

“I tell you what,” he holds up a finger as he swiftly downs the rest of his drink. “If you don’t have one of our songs as your freaking ring tone…”

She scoffs again, but her cheeks are turning red. _Lean into the flirting_ , she tells herself, draping a hand languidly on his arm. “You’ll what, Finn? Hmm?”

He licks his lips, slowly, deliberately. She’s transfixed, her own tongue sweeping along her bottom lip in tandem. Shit, he’s way better at the flirting game than she is. There’s no way she’s going to win.  He doesn’t answer her question, just tugs his phone out of his back pocket with a knowing grin, getting closer _again_. She keeps her eyebrows raised, face uncaring as he starts pressing at the screen, painfully slowly. He flicks through, turns the phone to show her a contact screen with her own miniature face sticking her tongue out.

“I’m dialing, Rae.” He warns, holding a finger dangerously over the screen.

She stays impassive, until he presses the button. “Fine!” She huffs, and just as the first few notes start to sound under the table, she lunges over to grab at his phone. He barks a startled laugh and leans back, holding it over his head. He looks smug, victorious, and she can’t have that, so she decides to just go for it. She wriggles to put a knee onto the seat, bending her body completely over him, her chest sliding over his.

He wasn’t expecting that, gets distracted by her boldness, and the game is over in seconds. She grabs his phone, presses end resolutely. She glances down once she’s gotten it, and Finn’s got a hand hovering in the air near her waist. She brushes past him once more to sit back down. He’s all flushed, has to run a hand through his hair. Rae grins, downs the rest of her tepid drink.

“Told ya.” He says, visibly shaking himself, trying to regain the upper hand. She likes him better this way, when he’s rattled, when he’s not quite so smooth.

“Whatever. You make fan sound like such a dirty word. Without fans, you wouldn’t be anything, hotshot.” She shakes her head at him, tries to radiate condescension.

He leans over, drops his arm from the back of the booth down onto her shoulders, twists his fingers in her hair. She shivers involuntarily as a slow, devious grin slips over his face. He bends closer, tips his head towards hers, slides a thumb along the back of her neck.

“You’ll know when I’m trying to make something sound dirty, I promise.” Finn rumbles, sending a hot flush rushing to her skin.

It’s hard to breathe for a second, hard to distinguish what’s air and what’s wanting. When she chances a half-glance at him, he’s biting his bottom lip, smug and collected, and something in her snaps without warning. As fun as this… whatever… between them has been tonight, it’s getting dangerously difficult to keep her head on.

She twists in his arms, turns to face him and bites out, “I’m not going to sleep with you tonight, Nelson.” He laughs, but his cheeks redden and for half a second she thinks, _my God, maybe I will._

“Why not?”

“Because I’m drunk, and you’re drunk.” She retorts.

He leans in closer, shaking his glass at her. “I’m not that drunk, Rae.”

He’s so close, he’s blurry, and she thinks that if he kisses her now, it’ll be a waste of all those months of longing because her lips are numb and she won’t feel it.

“Well, I am. And it doesn’t matter anyway, because, because Ha! There are no less than ten girls in this pub right now who’d gladly go home with you.”

“Yeah, but I don’t want any of those girls. There’s only one girl I want.”

She can’t think of a single thing to say. She just gapes, and he reaches in what feels like slow motion to pinch her chin between his thumb and forefinger, closing her mouth. Everything is glacier, fractions of a second ticking by with almost audible clicks. Click, his eyes are hot on her lips. Click, his thumb moves from the corner of her mouth. Click, he’s tugging at the center of her bottom lip. Click, he’s sliding his tongue painstakingly slowly over his own bottom lip. Click, _red red red_ , she can barely breathe. Click, he’s leaning in.

Rae jerks her head away, shakes it firmly. She doesn’t know if she’s shaking no, or if she’s shaking away the haze of the beer and Finn’s touch, or if she’s berating herself for not letting that moment follow through. She keeps shaking, shaking, shaking. No.

“I’m not just another girl, Finn. Another conquest, another bird you can take home and bag. We’re friends, and I won’t be another notch in your bedpost just because you decided you’re bored and I’m available.” She can’t look at him while she says this, says the unkind truth. They all pretend like they don’t see, like Finn’s out there looking for the one real thing like the rest of them. But he’s not, and she can’t allow herself to think otherwise.

Because the truth is, the miserable, sickening truth is… Rae wants him. She wants some of that magnetic pull for herself, wants to peel off his layers, his clothes and his stage persona and run her trembling fingers over everything she finds underneath. She’s wanted him since the first show, when she’d been one more of the stupid screaming girls thrashing about in the pit. And worse even, in the months since she’d first watched him play, she’s come to want more than that. She’s come to want it all.

It’s the worst part of her.

She keeps it tamped down, locked up tight, never to be looked at. She’s practiced willing it away, endlessly; every morning when thoughts of him beckon, every night when the liquor has warmed her up. She can’t give in to it even for a second.

Finn’s been silent for a long moment, and the buzz of the bar has taken over, filling her ears and head. She gives him a sidelong glance, doesn’t commit to turning to see his expression. She watches as he tilts his head up and closes his eyes, and even though she knows him, she can’t guess at what he’s thinking. He glances down at the heavily lacquered surface of the wooden table, always damp and sticky even before the drinks have been poured. And then he looks at her. She averts her eyes quickly, but he impatiently pushes her hair back to look at her face, so she turns and lets him.

“It hasn’t been that way for a long time, Rae. You know that. I don’t do that anymore.” It’s not pleading, it’s too firm, but something in her puts that word to the face he’s making and his tone. His arm is still heavy over her, and he cups her shoulder in his palm. “And, I know perfectly well that you’re not just another girl. Jesus.”

She cocks her head at him, lips thin, no smile to hide. She can’t figure out what that means, what any of this means. She’d thought it was a game, but this isn’t a playful flirtation anymore. It’s something else, and she’s had too much to drink and too many bad thoughts and far, far too much wanting to know what.

Finn takes a long sip from his beer, then shifts on his seat until his knee is pressed against hers, firmly. His arm drops from around her, and she feels too light for gravity for a second, dizzy with flight. Tentatively, eyes holding hers, he reaches down and rubs a finger along the denim at her knee. Rae has to fight not to close her eyes and savor the feeling.

“I’m not bored. Fuck, you really think I’d… No, that’s not important.” He shakes his head, and he’s shooting her that smile she’s seen a thousand times, always directed at a pretty girl with too much bared skin. “I’m not bored at all; this is the most fun I’ve had in ages, riling you up.”

“I’m not riled up.” She pouts automatically. It’s a total lie. She’s so fucking riled up, it’s crazy.

“Sure.” He chortles, and he moves his hand from her knee to press a finger gently against her breastbone, just below the hollow of her throat. She can feel the redness, doesn’t have to look down to see his finger set her skin ablaze. He leans in, laughter warm in his voice, “I like you all riled up.”

She swallows, closes her eyes. She’s trying to tamp down, lock it away, force herself to remember all the girls who’ve fallen prey to this tactic before. Like the blonde from earlier, the one who’s probably glaring daggers by now. Rae wants to look for her, see if Manny’s made his move. She wants to see if the night has worn down to drunk eventualities yet, if the night’s possibilities are gone. But the world has shrunk to this booth, to her and Finn, to the relentlessness of her wanting. She’s got to set it right once more, get it bigger than the two of them.

“Me and all the other girls in this pub.” She manages with some bite, and the edges of her vision start to leak back out to the real world. She knocks back the rest of her beer in relief. “You can’t expect me to fall for this, can you?” She swirls a finger in the air between them. “You’re just a flirt. You were flirting with that girl an hour ago, probably somebody else an hour before that. It’s just my turn.”

“I wasn’t flirting with her, Rae.” He counters quickly, darkly. “She asked me about Toxic Teenage Haze and I answered her, polite as can be. Flirting is very different. Can’t you tell?”

He studies her face for a long moment. She tries to keep it firm, to pretend that she’s not spinning from all this, but she’s not sure what he makes of it. He leans back against the seat, allows some space back between them. He rests an arm on the table top, stretches out to graze the back of her hand.

“Look,” his voice is gruffer, but still soft somehow. She watches as he curls his fingers around her wrist, as he flips her hand over to rub his thumb softly into the cup of her palm. His eyes are dark and warm and insistent when she meets his searching gaze, as they flicker down to look at her mouth and back up again. “Rae, I want you.”

He says it like a secret, like a plea. A gust of air leaves her unbidden, and she can’t help but flutter her eyelids shut. “Finn.” She says, and she can’t tell what it’s intended to mean.

“I want you, Rae. Maybe not tonight, maybe not drunk, but I want you. For real.” Carefully, eyes on hers, he brushes a finger along her jaw. “Have done for a while. I meant to be smoother about all this, tell you proper, but…” He looks down, shakes his head, shoots a dark look towards the bar. “You’re wearing that fucking top, and kissing the damned bartender, and I just lost, lost my senses a bit. Couldn’t dance around it anymore.”

She can’t catch her breath around the aching in her chest. She’s dazed, heavy lidded as she follows his gaze down to her cleavage, and if she wasn’t already so overheated, she’d blush at the exposed skin. He does, when he catches her watching, and somehow the stain on his cheeks makes her catch, makes her able to hang on to this moment, to believe him.

“Finn,” she mutters again, without knowing what will follow.

“Go out with me.” He demands. He’s smiling at her again, with a hint of that sexy smile of his that’s been known to literally make girls swoon.

“Why?” She blurts. She immediately wants to slam her head against the table, but none of her body parts seem to be operating the way they’re supposed to tonight. YES. She yells in her head, FOR FUCKS SAKE, SAY YES. But she can’t, because she’s deeply distrustful of this whole situation.

He cocks his head and considers her for a moment, and she tries to tabulate how much the two of them have had to drink tonight. She loses count when he answers, “Because we have fun together. Because I’ve been thinking kissing you for months. Because I fancy you. Is that enough?”

“You fancy me?” She asks, still skeptical. She thinks her drink count is somewhere around eight, and that’s enough for any or all of this to be purely in her imagination.

Finn twists his mouth up, laughs softly. He picks up her hand and rests it in his lap, toying with her fingers for a minute, sending tingles dancing up her arms. The world seems a bit steadier. His cheeks are pink.

“Look, Rae. Maybe… you don’t see me that way just now. Maybe I’m just your friend, like you said. Maybe you didn’t know we were flirting.” He rolls his eyes, huffs a disbelieving laugh that makes her smile involuntarily. “I think we could be good together, you and me. I think… I like you. Do you think, maybe, you could give it a shot? It’s just one date, and I promise it’ll be a good one.”

He smiles again, and this time it’s different. It’s softer, eager almost. He’s back to regular Finn, irresistible Finn, and she can feel the tension uncoil in her spine. She smiles at her lap, bites her lip.

“Just a date, huh?”

“And a kiss, surely.” He replies, grinning. “I mean, there’s no way I can live without a kiss from you.”

Rae reaches over to pat his cheek. “You’re going to have to, Finnley. Now budge up and let me out, I’ve got to go to the loo.”

He scoots out from the booth, extends a hand to help pull her up when she gets to the end. She’s a little unsteady but Finn laughs, righting her as she stumbles. She shoots him a playful scowl as she walks towards the back of the room. The other four are still dancing, Chloe spinning under Chop’s raised hand, Izzy twirling around them both. The world has continued on normally without them.

“Hey, what about our date?” He calls to her, and she walks backwards as she answers.

“S’pose!”


End file.
